Your Generosity Keeps Him Warm

New sweatshirts keep kids cozy through the night in rural Cambodia. 

Even Cambodia can get cold. Especially at Chea’s house. 

He lives in a house made of bamboo that’s surrounded by rice fields. During the cold months, the icy wind passes right through it. It’s sometimes so cold that Chea, his sister and grandmother wake up at night and make a fire just to stay warm. Chea was often too cold to walk to school in the morning. 

But not anymore! Last winter, Holt donors across the world gave Chea and other children in rural Cambodia big, cozy sweatshirts!

Isn’t it amazing that the solution is something as simple as a sweatshirt? But for families living in poverty, buying a sweatshirt – or anything that’s used just a few months of the year — is a luxury they can’t afford. But this “luxury” was actually a necessity. 

Those cold months used to be miserable for Chea. He suffered night upon night of shivering to sleep. And because he didn’t want to leave the fire to walk to school in the morning, he got behind in his education. 

“Isn’t it amazing that the solution is something as simple as a sweatshirt? But for families living in poverty, buying a sweatshirt – or anything that’s used just a few months of the year — is a luxury they can’t afford. But this ‘luxury’ was actually a necessity.” 

But doesn’t his big smile say it all? Now he stays cozied up in his cute reindeer sweatshirt with the yellow hood up through the night. And when it’s time to walk to school, he zips it up and it’s just the extra layer he needs to make it there comfortably. 

He wears it every day during the cold season and expressed his thanks to the Holt donors who gave it to him.